An alarming proportion of Ontario teenagers admit that they have texted while behind the wheel of a vehicle, says a survey of Grade 7 to 12 students in the province conducted for the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.

The 2013 Ontario Student Drug Use and Health Survey found that more than one-third of licensed Ontario students in Grades 10 to 12 — or an estimated 108,000 teenagers — reported having texted while driving at least once in the past year.

For Grade 12 students alone, 46% of those who drive say they also texted at least once while operating a vehicle.

“This was a big surprise to us,” said Robert Mann, a senior scientist at CAMH in Toronto. “We know that this is a very hazardous behaviour and some of the reports in the literature suggest that texting while you’re driving can increase your chances of being involved in a collision by about 20 times or more.

“I think that texting is considered to be considerably hazardous because you have to actually type on the keyboard while you’re driving,” he said.

Such distracted driving is illegal across Canada, yet many adults and teens continue to communicate by keyboard while in the driver’s seat.

Yet the student surveys have found that the percentage of students who reported drinking and driving has declined dramatically over the past 20 years, he said.

“So by way of contrast, it’s a bit of a shock to see that so many of them are taking this risk [texting].”

The survey, which has been conducted every two years since 1977, found that more than 80% of students reported visiting social media sites daily, with about one in 10 spending five hours or more on these sites each day. One in five teens said they play video games daily or almost daily. Males are almost four times as likely to spend time gaming than are females.

While not surprised that four out of five students are on social media daily, clinical psychologist Joanna Henderson, head of research in CAMH’s Child, Youth and Family Program, said those spending at least five hours a day raise concerns.

“If they’re spending five hours on social media, what are they not doing in those five hours? What are the other kinds of perhaps healthy behaviours that they could be engaged in that they’re not doing?” she posited, pointing to physical activity, school work and face-to-face relationships with family and friends.

“So what is being given up to have that really high level of engagement with social media?”

The Canadian Press

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/07/08/teen-texting-while-driving-rampant-ontario-survey-finds/feed/3stdtexting-1Gay teen boys six times more likely to use steroids than their straight counterparts: Studyhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2014/02/03/gay-teen-boys-six-times-more-likely-to-use-steroids-than-their-straight-counterparts-study-2/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/02/03/gay-teen-boys-six-times-more-likely-to-use-steroids-than-their-straight-counterparts-study-2/#commentsMon, 03 Feb 2014 20:54:39 +0000http://life.nationalpost.com/?p=131795

Gay and bisexual teen boys use illicit steroids at a rate almost six times higher than do straight kids, a “dramatic disparity” that points up a need to reach out to this group, researchers say.

Reasons for the differences are unclear. The study authors said it’s possible gay and bi boys feel more pressure to achieve a bulked-up “ideal” male physique, or that they think muscle-building steroids will help them fend off bullies.

Overall, 21% of gay or bisexual boys said they had ever used steroids, versus 4% of straight boys. The difference was similar among those who reported moderate use — taking steroid pills or injections up to 40 times: 8% of gay or bi teens reported that amount, versus less than 2% of straight boys. The heaviest use — 40 or more times — was reported by 4% of gays or bi boys, compared with less than 1% of straight teens.

Given the dramatic disparity … it would seem that this is a population in which greater attention is needed

The study is billed as the first to examine the problem; previous research has found similar disparities for other substance abuse.

“It’s a bit sad that we saw such a large health disparity,” especially among the most frequent steroid users, said co-author Aaron Blashill, a psychologist and scientist with the Fenway Institute, the research arm of a Boston health centre that treats gays and lesbians.

“Given the dramatic disparity … it would seem that this is a population in which greater attention is needed,” the authors said.

The nationally representative study is an analysis of government surveys from 2005 and 2007. It involved 17,250 teen boys aged 16 on average; almost 4% — 635 boys — were gay or bisexual. Blashill said it’s likely more recent data would show the disparities persist.

Dr. Rob Garofalo, adolescent medicine chief at Lurie Children’s Hospital in Chicago, said the differences aren’t surprising, since it is known that gay youth often have “body image issues.” But he said, “It is still shocking. These are dramatically high rates.”

The Food and Drug Administration issued a consumer update in November warning that teens and steroids are “a dangerous combo,” citing government data showing that about 5 per cent of high school boys and 2% of high school girls use steroids — more than a half-million kids.

Steroids include synthetic versions of the male hormone testosterone. Users take them to promote muscle growth, strength and endurance. Side effects can include heart and liver problems, high blood pressure, acne and aggressive behaviour. With their still-maturing bodies, teens face a heightened risk for problems that may be permanent, the FDA update.

Steroids are legally available only by prescription. There are few FDA-approved uses, including replacement of hormones in men who have unusually low levels.

Potential signs of abuse include mood swings, speedy muscle growth and even breast development in boys.

Garofalo said some of his gay and bi patients have admitted using steroids. Those patients sometimes have acne, high blood pressure, anxiety, or aggression related to steroid use, but those symptoms usually go away when the drug use stops, he said.

Kids are often less open about using steroids than about drinking or smoking marijuana, but the study helps raise awareness and the results suggest it’s a topic physicians should be raising with their patients, especially gay and bi kids, Garofalo said.

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/02/03/gay-teen-boys-six-times-more-likely-to-use-steroids-than-their-straight-counterparts-study-2/feed/0stdSP005585.jpgGay teen boys six times more likely to use steroids than their straight counterparts: Studyhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2014/02/03/gay-teen-boys-six-times-more-likely-to-use-steroids-than-their-straight-counterparts-study/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/02/03/gay-teen-boys-six-times-more-likely-to-use-steroids-than-their-straight-counterparts-study/#commentsMon, 03 Feb 2014 20:54:39 +0000http://life.nationalpost.com/?p=131795

Gay and bisexual teen boys use illicit steroids at a rate almost six times higher than do straight kids, a “dramatic disparity” that points up a need to reach out to this group, researchers say.

Reasons for the differences are unclear. The study authors said it’s possible gay and bi boys feel more pressure to achieve a bulked-up “ideal” male physique, or that they think muscle-building steroids will help them fend off bullies.

Overall, 21% of gay or bisexual boys said they had ever used steroids, versus 4% of straight boys. The difference was similar among those who reported moderate use — taking steroid pills or injections up to 40 times: 8% of gay or bi teens reported that amount, versus less than 2% of straight boys. The heaviest use — 40 or more times — was reported by 4% of gays or bi boys, compared with less than 1% of straight teens.

Given the dramatic disparity … it would seem that this is a population in which greater attention is needed

The study is billed as the first to examine the problem; previous research has found similar disparities for other substance abuse.

“It’s a bit sad that we saw such a large health disparity,” especially among the most frequent steroid users, said co-author Aaron Blashill, a psychologist and scientist with the Fenway Institute, the research arm of a Boston health centre that treats gays and lesbians.

“Given the dramatic disparity … it would seem that this is a population in which greater attention is needed,” the authors said.

The nationally representative study is an analysis of government surveys from 2005 and 2007. It involved 17,250 teen boys aged 16 on average; almost 4% — 635 boys — were gay or bisexual. Blashill said it’s likely more recent data would show the disparities persist.

Dr. Rob Garofalo, adolescent medicine chief at Lurie Children’s Hospital in Chicago, said the differences aren’t surprising, since it is known that gay youth often have “body image issues.” But he said, “It is still shocking. These are dramatically high rates.”

The Food and Drug Administration issued a consumer update in November warning that teens and steroids are “a dangerous combo,” citing government data showing that about 5 per cent of high school boys and 2% of high school girls use steroids — more than a half-million kids.

Steroids include synthetic versions of the male hormone testosterone. Users take them to promote muscle growth, strength and endurance. Side effects can include heart and liver problems, high blood pressure, acne and aggressive behaviour. With their still-maturing bodies, teens face a heightened risk for problems that may be permanent, the FDA update.

Steroids are legally available only by prescription. There are few FDA-approved uses, including replacement of hormones in men who have unusually low levels.

Potential signs of abuse include mood swings, speedy muscle growth and even breast development in boys.

Garofalo said some of his gay and bi patients have admitted using steroids. Those patients sometimes have acne, high blood pressure, anxiety, or aggression related to steroid use, but those symptoms usually go away when the drug use stops, he said.

Kids are often less open about using steroids than about drinking or smoking marijuana, but the study helps raise awareness and the results suggest it’s a topic physicians should be raising with their patients, especially gay and bi kids, Garofalo said.

An EU report on childhood and adolescence says that parents who give young children alcohol in an attempt to teach them about responsible drinking may be doing more harm than good.

Psychologist Dr. Aric Sigman, who wrote the report, says alcohol consumption may have long-lasting effects on the adolescent brain, “even in small amounts.” Parents, he says, are wrong to assume otherwise.

Research shows that people who have their first drink under the age of 18 run a higher risk of becoming dependent on alcohol as an adult. The earlier a child is introduced to alcohol, the greater the risk.

Sigman told the Daily Mail that it is “imperative” that parents delay the introduction of alcohol to their children.

“Protecting our young people from the harm of drinking means that now, in the light of new information about the effects of alcohol, it is necessary to review the way the entire EU views concepts of adulthood and drinking age.”

In an ideal world, no one would be drinking before age 25

Sigman says that in an ideal world, no one would be drinking before age 25, but he thinks that 16 is likely a more realistic age for children to have their first taste of alcohol at home.

Sigman is calling for the legal drinking age to be harmonized at 18 across Europe.

The warnings in the report come as liver disease rates in England are increasing at an alarming rate. In the last decade, the number of people under 30 being admitted to British hospitals with alcohol-related liver damage has doubled.

Health Canada estimates that four to five million Canadians engage in “high risk drinking,” which is “linked to motor vehicle accidents, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and other health issues, family problems, crime and violence.”

One of the videos depicts teenagers setting ablaze various parts of their own clothing, another shows giggling youth creating fiery explosions, while still more feature boys dousing various objects with accelerants before gleefully igniting them.“It’s no good unless someone gets hurt,” concludes a participant in one.

YouTube is replete with such home-made, widely viewed clips portraying dangerous fire-setting behaviour — which a new Canadian study suggests might be exacerbating an already serious arson problem among young people.

Related

The impact of the short movies is unclear, but they have certainly caught the attention of an unusual sub-set of troubled youth, notes the study. A growing number of clients in the arson prevention program for children at Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) report watching the videos, the researchers say.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4MZoF9oyOE&w=640&h=390]

Raymond Corrado, a criminologist at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, compared them to the online recordings of fights and other violence that have also become commonplace recently, and worries they could have a “contagion” effect among like-minded children.

“Does it add a new wrinkle to the challenges that parents and officials, police and teachers and the rest of us face? I would definitely say so,” said Prof. Corrado, who was not involved in the study. “It’s a new sort of variable in our trying to understand young people and criminal behaviours and violent behaviours.”

While the phenomenon garners relatively little public attention, juvenile fire setting and arson take a considerable toll, notes the paper by scientists at CAMH, just published in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

Statistics for Canada are hard to come by, but U.S. authorities say child fire starters were behind 56,300 of the blazes reported to American fire departments from 2005 to 2009, resulting in 110 civilian deaths, 880 civilian injuries and $268-million in property damage.

About half of those children were five years old or younger, according to the Juvenile Fire Starter Intervention Program in Illinois.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbQTB02vfbM&w=640&h=390]

Some, mainly children under seven, play with fire out of curiosity, and generally fail to understand its destructive potential, the program says. Others, typically aged over five, act out because of emotional or mental disturbances, possibly triggered by a divorce, death or other crisis in their lives.

The authors of the Toronto article said they set out to explore what was available on YouTube after hearing from a number of clients who had viewed videos on the Net.

The search term “fire, fun” turned up 27,200 clips, and the authors closely examined almost 50 of the most popular, they reported.

About three-quarters depicted “completely inappropriate” fire-related behaviour, like the video that shows male youths spraying some kind of aerosol accelerant on their clothes — including the crotch of one boy — then setting the clothing alight.

In fact, someone was set on fire in 16% of the clips, while a burn injury was clear in 10% and suspected in another 10%, the study found.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHlI4Wa99KM&w=640&h=390]

The videos seemed popular, with a third of them viewed more than 10,000 times, while 8% had over 100,000 hits, according to the paper.

It is a concern the material is so readily available to young people, probably with no parental oversight, said Steve Gamble, first vice president of the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs.

“It’s just brought it more out in the open, more people share it, whereas when I was a kid, if someone did something bad, it was a very small group that saw it,” said Mr. Gamble, chief of the Langley Township fire department in B.C. “You worry about the ones who are on the borderline. Does this inspire them?”

In fact, whether electronic media influence young people to misbehave is an ongoing debate among experts, the CAMH researchers note, with some convinced media violence directly sparks aggressive behaviour, and others arguing that one never leads to the other.

Prof. Corrado said he believes such material is unlikely to motivate young people who are not predisposed in any way to playing with fire. The clips could, however, incite copy-cat acts among youth who already fit the profile for fire-setting behaviour, he said.

Related

In an instant, a smirking Topalli is back on his feet, eager to teach his young audience the basics of breaking — or breakdancing, as it’s commonly known — alongside his mentor, Drew Moore.

The duo is part of Concrete Roots, a Halifax-based program that uses breaking and hip hop to reach out to young people and turn stereotypes on their heads.

“We place a strong emphasis on creativity; you learn how to do a dance a certain way and then you’re very much encouraged to break away from that and find your own style,” says Moore, a professional B-boy and director of Concrete Roots.

“That’s something that really appeals to a lot of kids. You see them light up.”

The 32-year-old former teacher became interested in breaking after watching a music video by rap group Run DMC and DJ Jason Nevins as a teen. The 1998 video for It’s Like That features infectious beats and a high-octane dance battle between B-boys and B-girls.

Moore started teaching breaking in 2004 as a modest after school program while working at a middle school in Milford, N.S. The program eventually expanded to schools in Halifax and has since held workshops and other programming as far away as Yukon.

Many of Concrete Roots’ first students are now instructors with the program. They host free drop-in practices for anyone who wants to try their hand — and feet — at the intricate manoeuvres.

The program has also spawned several dance crews, including Eastern Bloc, made up of B-boys all originally from Eastern countries. Among its members is Topalli, who came to Canada from Kosovo as a child.

The Grade 12 student attended his first Concrete Roots lesson a couple of years ago with one goal in mind: learning to do a head spin.

“When I break, it feels good,” says Topalli, who’s since taken up salsa and other dance.

“It feels like I’m in the moment and everybody’s having fun. It’s a good vibe.”

Breaking emerged from the gritty boroughs of New York City in the 1970s as a street-based dance and flourished as hip hop grew in popularity. Dancers would duke it out in so-called battles, each one trying to outshine the other with an innovative move.

Using it as a means to engage youth some four decades later isn’t unique to Concrete Roots.

Stephen Leafloor has been teaching breaking to youth in aboriginal communities for about six years as part of his program, Blueprint for Life. Recently, he began working with young aboriginal offenders at correctional facilities.

He says breaking is more than fancy footwork — it helps teach confidence and co-operation while celebrating youth and spontaneity.

“For us, it’s about healing and it’s a way of helping provide a modern-day survival tool kit for young people to use and adapt to their own culture and identity,” says Leafloor, a social worker and B-boy.

“It’s got so much flexibility: art, music, dance, passion, swagger.”

Leafloor says his program doesn’t accept the stereotypes often associated with hip hop culture. He chalks those misconceptions up to a lack of education.

“We don’t buy into bling-bling and booty shaking and gangster rap,” he says. “That’s one of the very first things we talk to the kids about.”

Moore says breaking is a freestyle form of dance that can provide kids with the structure they need.

“We’re teaching them leadership skills and the idea of forming crews and having a positive support system will keep them on the right path,” he says.

At Oldfield, the fascinated youngsters peer up at Moore, staring as though the tall, friendly man might drop to the floor and do a head spin so fast they’ll miss it if they blink.

“What’s up, party people?” Moore calls out to his young, captivated audience before leading them through a series of steps.

The youngsters squeal as they attempt to cross their legs, spin and crouch down at once. Most of the novices fall to the floor in a giggling heap, but others get the hang of it and throw in a few extra spins for good measure.

Kim LeBlanc, principal at Oldfield, says students are never too young to learn the importance of feeling good about themselves.
“I think it’s all about building self-esteem first,” she says. “Kids start as young as seven, eight and nine years old feeling bad about the way they look, the way they feel.”

Topalli doesn’t hesitate when asked about the benefits of breaking; happily rattling off leadership skills, meeting new friends and gaining self-respect.

It’s also given him the opportunity to see new parts of the world. He was one of six dancers representing Canada at an international breaking event last year in the Netherlands.

“Concrete roots has made me feel better about myself,” says Topalli.

“I have more self-confidence. I walk down the street with my chin up.”

After a string of arson attacks on Lower Mainland schools, the Vancouver School Board is fast-tracking plans to reintroduce the Mosquito, a controversial device that wards off teenagers using a shrill noise that only they can hear.

“As long as you’re putting it on private property — which is what school board property is — and you’re doing it in an open, informed way, it’s fine,” said Vancouver school trustee Mike Lombardi, noting that Vancouver schools are hit with $500,000 in vandalism per year.

Invented in the U.K., the Mosquito exploits the gradual degradation of the human ear to zero in on a frequency that can only be heard by people between the ages of 13 and 25. Although the sound is imperceptible to adults, to teenagers it is often described as “nails on a chalkboard.”

School board maintenance staff had installed 33 of the units by March, before complaints from neighbours and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association prompted trustees to order them all switched off.

In the weeks since, Kerrisdale Annex, an elementary school that had been equipped with the devices, had its playground charred by vandals. Over the Victoria Day weekend, vandals broke windows at another elementary school and launched an incendiary device into a classroom, causing some smoke damage.

Glenn Baglo/Postmedia News filesHenry Peters, principal at Vancouver's Thunderbird Elementary school, under a mesh box containing a Mosquito device. The school board ordered it disconnected earlier in this year pending further study.

Fires aside, Silise Lebedovich, a parent of students at Kerrisdale, told Vancouver media in early May that disabling the devices had had an immediate effect on playground safety. “The children have a right to go to school on Monday morning and not sidestep human feces, avoid needles, or see graffiti,” she told Postmedia.

To be put before a school board committee Tuesday night, the proposal to reactivate the devices comes with an official thumbs-up from Vancouver Coastal Health, as well as a legal endorsement from the Board’s lawyers. “Assuming that access to school property during the night is not a service customarily made available to any member of the public, there doesn’t appear to be any basis for a complaint of discrimination under the Human Rights Code,” reads an opinion by Vancouver-based law firm Harris and Company.

The devices can only be switched on between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., and must be surrounded by proper signage “to make sure there’s no misunderstanding,” said Mr. Lombardi.

Others remain unconvinced. “I don’t understand how any lawyer could come to the conclusion that a government could punish youth differently than an adult,” said David Eby, executive director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association.

In a recent op-ed, Mr. Eby warned that the effectiveness of the device may soon make it irresistible for a myriad of teen-plagued businesses — transforming urban areas into a landscape of “extremely annoying noise pollution” for teenagers. “If they’re good enough for schools, why not out front of all urban liquor stores, convenience stores, and fast food restaurants?” he wrote.

The technology is certainly gaining ground. “Sales are increasing every year; this year we’ll do $800,000 of Mosquitoes,” said Mike Gibson, president of Vancouver-based Moving Sound Technologies, which manages North American sales of the device. A single Mosquito retails for $1100.

‘It doesn’t make them bolt and run, it just creates an annoying sound’

At the Nanaimo Aquatic Centre in Nanaimo, B.C., the device was installed to clear crowds of teens blocking the front door: When the gaggle gets too thick, staff simply hit them with a five-minute burst from the Mosquito.

“It doesn’t make them bolt and run, it just creates an annoying sound,” said Mark Demecha, Nanaimo’s manager of civic facilities. “It’s funny, when we first got it, we turned it on and you could immediately see the teenager’s heads move.”

Although it is marketed as a “ultrasonic anti-loitering teen deterrent,” the Mosquito can be toggled to play slightly lower frequencies to target loiterers as old as 65. The problem, said Mr. Gibson, is that the lower frequencies cannot be as acutely focused as the teen-only sound beams, and are more likely to bounce onto neighbouring properties.

Of course, teens can easily “beat” the device by wearing earplugs or an iPod at medium volume. In the U.K., high school students have even used the technology to their advantage by configuring their cell phones with teacher-proof ultrasonic ring tones. “All the kids were laughing about something, but I didn’t know what,” a Welsh schoolteacher told the website Gadget Spy in 2006.

Still, Mr. Gibson maintains the Mosquito can still squash the appeal of a shadowy hangout spot. “Kids aren’t going to want to hang out and not talk to their friends.”

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/06/05/vancouver-schools-to-fight-vandalism-with-teen-repelling-sound-device/feed/3stdMosquitoMosquitoOh, The Humanities!: The problem with sex and Christian purityhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2012/05/26/oh-the-humanities-the-problem-with-traditional-christian-purity/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/05/26/oh-the-humanities-the-problem-with-traditional-christian-purity/#commentsSat, 26 May 2012 11:00:45 +0000http://life.nationalpost.com/?p=66704

More than 7,000 academics are gathered in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont., this week for the annual Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, presenting papers on everything from scatological censorship in children’s books to the brand power of ParticipACTION. In this week-long series, the National Postshowcases some of the most interesting research.

HandoutDoris Kieser

As Christian girls enter teenhood, the warning takes on a new urgency: Don’t have sex before marriage if you want to remain pure in the eyes of God. It’s a message spread mostly in evangelical Christian communities, but also in Catholic and Orthodox traditions to various extents. And it’s a message that can be problematic when reinforced through such glamourized methods as purity balls — a prom-like event where a father pledges to help keep his daughter chaste — purity pledges to abstain from sexual activity and “pure” fashion that promotes modest dress, says Doris Kieser, a Catholic professor of theology at the University of Alberta and a psychological counsellor. Prof. Kieser will present her work at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences conference in Kitchener-Waterloo next week. She spoke with the Post’s Sarah Boesveld.

Related

Q: What do these more traditionalist Christians mean when they talk about preserving purity? A: What we’re seeing today is a fairly narrow interpretation of the idea of purity and that it’s applied only to sexuality and sex. Historically, it had to do with food, it had to do with social class, everything. But what’s difficult about the more modern interpretation is that what defines sexual abstinence and purity is not nailed down by one equivocal definition. It varies.

Q: So kind of like the way teens ask, “Does oral sex count as sex?” A: Exactly. And the movements that are out there have very tightly defined notions of purity. The person who started purity balls, Randy Wilson in Colorado Springs, Co., wouldn’t let his daughters date anyone that he had not vetted himself; they’ve married people basically that he has chosen for them. From what I understand, they had not — at least the oldest daughter — had not kissed her husband until their wedding day.

Q: How do you know if he’s a good kisser? Does that matter? A: The idea is that’s not the most important thing. Fair enough, except that what happens is there’s so much tied up in sexual interaction that if it’s not what it’s cracked up to be, then that’s it. Marriage and sex become very inextricably connected and one of the negative sides of that is you see very young people getting married so they can have sex.

Q: If there’s nothing wrong with wanting your daughter to be pure, what’s wrong with promoting purity in this way? A: The big concern is that purity is understood as a state. It’s not about teaching moral agency, it’s not about inviting people to make choices, it’s either you’re pure or you’re not. That’s kind of the way it plays out in each of these movements. We have to be willing to allow for the fact that no one is ever going to be completely pure. When we set that up as a moral ideal, we’re setting people up to fail. What we want are people who can make decisions well and we know, yes, we know 13-year-olds are probably not the best moral decision-makers, but they’re practising. The way purity is promoted is also very gendered — the men are making all the decisions.

Q: Are you saying that girls should have sex and/or sexual experiences before marriage? A: I think there should be more sexual awareness. I think absolutely people need to know this stuff and they need to go in with their eyes wide open and to understand that sexuality in and of itself is a good thing. Being sexually active with a partner is a good thing, but it requires a lot of emotional maturity. But the research shows the longer you wait, the better your experiences are.

Soon, probably some time in the very near future, we’re all going to have to ask ourselves a question, one whose profundity extends far beyond a mere automotive column, one that’s being pondered by far deeper thinkers than me. Indeed, I hesitate to ask it here since I am but a mere car journo and, while the automotive industry may employ 50 million people worldwide, its plight is still trifling by comparison. So, at the risk of revealing just how shallow I truly am, I posit the following:

Related

Can we really believe that a virtual world is truly the equal of real life?

Yes, I know it sounds suspiciously like something an undergrad philosophy student with not enough homework might try to use to impress the cutie in line at Starbucks. Nonetheless, it is a question perplexing automobile manufacturers. The stranglehold on the hearts and minds of the young that they’ve enjoyed since the invention of the automobile is slowly slipping away as our spawn closet themselves away in their basement lairs, noses buried in iPhones or iPads or whatever else passes for human interaction these days.

John McFarland, Chevrolet’s senior manager of global marketing strategy, probably expressed the situation best when he told attendees at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit last week that 54% of millennials would rather connect with their friends via social media than actually get in their cars and physically interact.

That statistic, naturally, is extremely worrying to automakers. By General Motors’ reckoning, the youth market potentially represents as much as 40% of its sales, a real market in peril of losing its mojo to a virtual one.

That concern is already influencing car design. GM, for instance, launched its MyLink onboard infotainment system at the Detroit auto show, its latest complex and sophisticated interactive system seemingly a reaction to crosstown rival’s MyFord Touch system. It’s also yet another poke in the eye to all those safety experts decrying the distractions overwhelming those behind the wheels of their cars. One assumes that staying connected with one’s “Facebookies” is more important than not hitting that bridge abutment.

For a moment, put aside the thought that these may be the mutterings of a fuddy-duddy who wonders if young people will really be better off without experiencing the joy that is their first long-distance road trip. Or, that like all gear head dads, I assume my offspring’s existence would be enhanced with the piecing together of an ancient and crumbling Galaxie 500 with duct tape, bailing wire and, yes, even the judicious placement of a matchbook cover. Or even — God forbid the parents find out — the thrill of their first tire-squealing burnout in their father’s ’64 Biscayne. Those can be easily dismissed as just the reminisces of yet another old fogey longing for his past.

But do we really want to replace the real with the pretend? Virtually every one of the aforementioned youthful exploits can be replicated online, albeit with updated and more exotic machinery. Yet, does a full-throttle launch in a virtual Ferrari in any way match the real-world version in a rusty old two-tone Chevy (hey, it had the optional 283-cube V8)? Does an xBox ride around the Nürburgring circuit in any way replicate the terror of throwing a McLaren-powered BMW X6 into the Carousel? Hell, does anything digital even match the satisfaction of the first time you parallel park between two crowded sport-utility vehicles?

Still, there can be no denying the allure: We are a lazy species after all. Given the choice of swatting the perfect 200-kilometres-an-hour serve at Wimbledon and watching the same thing on TV, most of us will just grab a fresh bag of potato chips and sink farther into the couch. It is that very laziness that so concerns automakers. After all, why, if you’re a particularly lethargic youth, waste all that energy pushing down on a gas pedal in the real world where it might, God forbid, rain or snow, when you can just bang a few keys, never more than five metres away from the fridge and that two-litre jug of Mountain Dew?

The truly worrisome part, far deeper than concerns about whether any particular automaker — or even automobiles in general — survives is what happens to us when we can’t be motivated to get off our sorry behinds and go out and mingle.

Am I really on the delusional side of the slippery slope to wonder if this much Facebooking will turn us all into pasty blobs so inactive that we require robots to feed us our Twinkies? Far more prophetically, perhaps, are those relationships cultivated on the World Wide Web as significant as those formalized when we get in our cars and head over to watch the Super Bowl in our cousin John’s basement? My son, for instance, has legions of online “besties” but only one actual long-term good friend. You guessed it: They’ve known each other since Grade 3 and meet in person (she drives over) at least once a week.

For more than 100 years, the car has brought people together. So, too, now do Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and myriad other social media I’ve managed to avoid. I’ll leave it to you to decide which one does it better.

]]>http://www.driving.ca/auto-news/news/dialed-in-but-losing-out/feed/0stdAutomakers worry that teens would rather Facebook than drive.Alberta man charged with drunk driving after four teens killed in crashhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2011/10/23/alberta-man-facing-criminal-charges-after-four-teens-killed-in-crash/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/10/23/alberta-man-facing-criminal-charges-after-four-teens-killed-in-crash/#commentsSun, 23 Oct 2011 17:03:32 +0000http://news.nationalpost.com/?p=102424

By Nicki Thomas

EDMONTON — Before Matthew Deller left for a party on Friday night, the Alberta teen caught up with his older half-brother on Facebook.

Christopher Ehrler told the 16-year-old to be safe. Deller assured him he would.

When Ehrler, 19, went back online on Saturday morning, he heard the news: Deller, along with three of his teammates from the Grande Prairie Composite High School Warriors football team, died after a pickup truck hit their car.

Related

“I told him I loved him and he told me he loved me too,” an emotional Ehrler said from his home in Sherwood Park, Alta., Sunday afternoon. “And the next thing I know, he’s gone.”

Vincent Stover, 16, Walter Borden-Wilkins, 15, and Tanner Hildebrand, 15, were also killed in the early morning crash. A fifth teen, Zach Judd, 15, is in critical but stable condition in an Edmonton hospital.

Impaired driving charges have been laid against a 21-year-old Grande Prairie, Alta., man in connection with the crash, which happened just after midnight on Saturday on Highway 668, an industrial road about two kilometres east of Highway 40. The teens were on their way home from a party.

Hundreds of people wearing the Warriors’ orange and black team colours attended a vigil for the boys Saturday night, releasing orange balloons into the night sky.

“We are praying for you Zach,” read a poster still hanging at Legion field Sunday. “You are a WARRIOR fight buddy, fight.”

By Sunday, Facebook memorial pages for the other boys, both individually and as a group, had attracted hundreds of people.

In a group dedicated to Deller, the father of one of four teens killed in a Magrath, Alta., car accident last week reached out to those now grieving in Grande Prairie.

“Our hearts and prayers are with you at this time,” wrote Gord Card, whose 16-year-old son Clay Card was among the southern Alberta victims. “We have a strong idea of what you are going through and how you are feeling. Stick close with your friends, family and community and they will help you through this.”

Ehrler said Deller’s friends flooded his Facebook inbox with messages over the weekend.

“I can just see that he was the type of person you could go to for anything and he would say three words and you would feel better,” said Ehrler, who was adopted. He met Deller and their two other brothers for the first time about seven years ago.

“He just completely accepted me as his brother,” said Ehrler. “I’m so proud of the way he lived his life.”

Stover, a Grade 11 student, joined his first football team when he was seven years old, said his grandmother Sheila Wilson.

“He was the littlest guy on the team, but he loved it anyways,” Wilson said.

Brendan Holubowich faces 11 charges in all, including four counts of impaired driving causing death, four counts of operating a vehicle with over .08 blood-alcohol causing death, impaired driving causing bodily harm, operating a motor vehicle over .08 causing bodily harm and failing to remain at the scene of an accident.

Holubowich was released on $2,000 bail on Sunday, according to Grande Prairie RCMP.

Conditions of his release include remaining in Alberta, keeping the peace and reporting by telephone, said RCMP spokeswoman Cpl. Carol McKinley.

He will appear in court on Oct. 31.

Grande Prairie is about 470 kilometres northwest of Edmonton.

Edmonton Journal with files from Postmedia News

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/10/23/alberta-man-facing-criminal-charges-after-four-teens-killed-in-crash/feed/0stdA poster for Zach Judd, the only one of five teens to survive a car crash in Grande Prairie, Alta. early Saturday, hangs following a vigil for the victims in Grand Prairie, Alta. October 23, 2011. Judd, 15, is in critical but stable condition in an Edmonton hospital. A 21-year-old man is facing impaired driving charges in connection with the crash.Four teens killed in Alberta car crashhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2011/10/23/four-teens-killed-in-alberta-car-crash/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/10/23/four-teens-killed-in-alberta-car-crash/#commentsSun, 23 Oct 2011 15:23:22 +0000http://news.nationalpost.com/?p=102413

By Brent Wittmeier

EDMONTON — Alcohol and speed are believed to be factors in a Saturday morning collision south of Grande Prairie, Alta., that killed four teens and critically injured a 15-year-old, all of whom may have played for the same high school football team.

Police were called at 12:06 a.m. after a pickup truck driven by a 21-year-old man collided with a car carrying five male teens, said RCMP Cpl. Carol McKinley.

The teens, all students at Grande Prairie Composite high school, were driving on Highway 668, an industrial road, about two kilometres east of Highway 40 when the vehicles collided.

Two of the teens killed were 15 years old, and the other two were 16. A 15-year-old boy was airlifted to hospital with critical injuries, and is currently in an Edmonton area hospital.

Family members identified one of the dead as Vincent Stover, 16. The Grade 11 student joined his first football team when he was seven years old, said his grandmother Sheila Wilson.

“He was the littlest guy on the team, but he loved it anyways,” Wilson said.

This summer, Stover was helping a local carpenter to save up money for a trip to San Diego with the Warriors, Grande Prairie Composite’s football team.

From what Wilson understands, Stover and some of his friends from the football team were on their way home from a party when their car was struck by the pickup truck.

Grande Prairie Mayor Bill Given, who was born and raised in the city, said he cannot recall another time when one crash claimed so many young lives at once.

“It’s obviously a tragic loss. I think the community right now is still in a little bit of shock. Grande Prairie isn’t a small town, but we do have a very close-knit community,” Given said.

Grande Prairie Composite High School is one of two high schools in Grande Prairie, and the only public secondary school in the city.

“It will affect a significant amount of the school-age kids in the community,” Given said.

The driver of the pickup truck, also from Grande Prairie, fled the scene but was arrested a short time later. He remains in custody and charges are pending.

The investigation is ongoing, with speed and alcohol being investigated as contributing factors.

William Vavrek, a photographer in Grande Prairie, arrived at the scene about 20 minutes after the accident was reported.

“There was a crushed car, there was two engine trucks and a dozen firefighters taking people out of the vehicle,” said Vavrek. “There was actually a bunch of teenagers on the side of the road.”

Vavrek said the car was in the south ditch of the road. RCMP took the memory card from Vavrek’s camera, he said.

The deadly accident comes less than a week after four teens from a small town in southern Alberta were killed in a single-vehicle rollover. Before dawn last Sunday, paramedics and police found a car upside down and partially submerged in a creek east of Magrath, 32 kilometres south of Lethbridge. The victims of that accident were two 16-year-old boys and two 14-year-old girls.

In that accident, initial investigations pointed to speed and inexperience, not alcohol.

If you getting concerned that your local teenagers are not exhibiting signs of higher intelligence, wait a few years and things may change.

A new British study found that as their brains go through dramatic development, teens’ IQ scores can significantly rise or fall. The finding is contrary to popular belief in the scientific community that IQ remains relatively static compared to people of the same age throughout a person’s life.

Researchers at Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at University College London tested the IQs of 33 healthy teens between the ages of 12 and 16 in 2004. They also took MRI brain scans at the same time. Four years later the tests were repeated.

The study found that in the second round of testing some of the teens had improved their IQ scores relative to people of a similar age by as much as 20 points, while others had their scores decrease by a similar amount.

“We found a considerable amount of change in how our subjects performed on the IQ tests in 2008 compared to four years earlier. Some subjects performed markedly better but some performed considerably worse. We found a clear correlation between this change in performance and changes in the structure of their brains and so can say with some certainty that these changes in IQ are real,” researcher Sue Ramsden said.

The study’s authors say the results raise a lot of questions over why some IQs changed so much and why some improved while others’ declined. The researchers suggest this may simply be a case of some teens being early or late developers. However, factors like education could also have played a role.

“We have a tendency to assess children and determine their course of education relatively early in life, but here we have shown that their intelligence is likely to be still developing. We have to be careful not to write off poorer performers at an early stage when in fact their IQ may improve significantly given a few more years.

“It’s analogous to fitness. A teenager who is athletically fit at 14 could be less fit at 18 if they stopped exercising. Conversely, an unfit teenager can become much fitter with exercise,” lead researcher Professor Cathy Price said.

Nicole Goldstein was just 17, finished high school and about to start community college, when she took the step she had been dreaming of through years of cruel taunting, and finally had her plus-sized nose surgically transformed.

Her older sister underwent a nose job at the same time, and Ms. Goldstein said she knows many other teenage girls who have had similar operations recently while in high school or college. At clinics across the country, meanwhile, cosmetic surgeons are performing operations to fix protruding ears on even younger children — some barely out of Kindergarten — in what has become a surprising and contentious phenomenon.

Doctors say they see a sharp spike at this time of year in the number of young aestheic-surgery patients like Ms. Goldstein, eager to have their operation and heal in time for the return to class, be it in Grade 1 or first-year university.

One British Columbia cosmetic surgeon even recommends children get such work done as early in life as possible to extract full benefit from their new, improved look. In Ontario, the ear surgery is covered by the province’s medicare system for patients under 18 years old.

“The idea behind doing it at an early age … is we want them to enjoy the advantages,” said Dr. Tom Buonassisi, a Vancouver facial plastic-surgery specialist. “If they have a very, very prominent feature … it helps them emotionally at an early age.”

Others, however, call the trend a particularly disturbing symbol of an image-obsessed era, telegraphing to children that people should conform to narrow definitions of beauty, rather than embrace imperfection.

Nevertheless, Dr. Buonassisi said he sees a spike of about 30% in the number of child and teenage patients at his 8 West Cosmetic Surgery clinic this time of year. Dr. Philip Solomon, a Toronto facial cosmetic and reconstructive surgeon, said he experiences a similar seasonal bump, noting that he had done nose jobs on five teenagers heading off to university one day earlier this week.

Over the course of the year he said he operates on more than 100 teenagers and 50 younger children, part of an “exploding” cosmetic surgery market that has seen patients come to him from an increasingly broad range of demographic backgrounds.

About 60-70% of the cosmetic ear operations Dr. Buonassisi does are on children under 10, he said.

Ms. Goldstein, now 19, said her large nose seemed out of proportion with her petite body, and “all through childhood” had asked her parents about getting the hated proboscis made smaller.

“Kids are really mean, and a lot of people did comment on it,” said the recent graduate of the fashion program at Toronto’s George Brown College. “I’m so much happier, I have so much more self-confidence. I think it was the best thing I could have done.”

Rhinoplasty, or nose reshaping, can be performed once the nose has stopped growing — about age 14 to 16 for girls, 17 or 18 for boys, physicians say. Otoplasty, the ear operation, is done as early as age five, by which time the appendage is fully formed. In fact, some parents come in to talk to Dr. Buonassisi about operating on children when they are just three or four years old, though they’re told to come back in a couple of years.
Young children are put under general anesthetic for both procedures.

Sometimes, teenage girls show up on their own, asking for the procedures without their parents’ knowledge, which presents a dilemma to surgeons, said Dr. Solomon.

With elementary-school-age youngsters, the motive is typically a self-consciousness about ears that stick out too far and become an unwanted focus of attention, said Dr. Buonassisi. As often as not with those children, it is the parents more than the patients who are anxious to get the work done, having had unpleasant experiences themselves with the same inherited trait.

In Ontario, the provincial government picks up the $500 fee for the ear reshaping operation on children under 18, the only purely cosmetic procedure covered by medicare, said Dr. Solomon. Work on “outstanding ears” is listed under operations for “congenital deformities” in the province’s medical fee schedule.

If previous generations felt slightly sheepish about admitting to undergoing cosmetic work, adolescents today seem more open about their operations, even sometimes posting before-and-after photographs on their Facebook page, said Dr. Solomon. That, in turn, has inspired others to consider surgery.

Teenage girls are also influenced by news of celebrities getting work done, he said, such as the 20-something pop star who reportedly had a nose job in 2006.

“When that became widespread information to the public in media like People magazine, I had an upswing in patients coming in and saying ‘I want a nose like Ashlee Simpson.’ ” recalled Dr. Solomon. “They’ll come in with a picture of [reality TV star Kim] Kardashian, liking her lips, liking her cheeks. I also find a lot of young girls are getting lip enhancements. If they get their nose done and they have small lips, they want an injection of things like Restylane.”

To some observers, however, cosmetic surgery for children and teenagers is simply wrong.

Quite apart from the sociological considerations, any operation under anesthetic carries risks, which normally are weighed against the medical benefits of a procedure, not the aesthetic results, said Anne Rochon Ford, executive director of the Canadian Women’s Health Network.

Related

But the phenomenon is also typical of a society that has put increasing pressure on girls, especially, to fit themselves into a narrow ideal of physical appearance, and has “normalized” cosmetic medicine, she said.

“People are prepared to put their children through surgery to supposedly look better? That I find is a very disturbing commentary on our culture,” said Ms. Rochon Ford. “What that does is only increase prejudice and ill viewing of anybody that veers from that norm, which is completely insane.”

The surgeons say they are cognizant of such criticism, and will typically refuse to perform the procedures on children whose features seem in little need of enhancement, or whose parents appear to be pushing surgery for dubious reasons.

“In a perfect world, we wouldn’t care about those [body image] things,” conceded Dr. Buonassisi while at the same time stressing the emotional benefits of nose and ear work. Even his receptionist, he said, notices how much more confident children seem when they come back for their check-up after six weeks.

Ms. Goldstein said revamping the nose that had been the brunt of so much teasing made a world of difference to her, but also suggests that today’s beauty-obsessed culture is driving young people to the operating room.

“If the media is going to put out publications and videos and whatnot of these beautiful people … how can our society expect us to be OK with who we are?” she asks. “Everyone wants to be that little bit closer to something they see in the media, something they see as perfect.”

National Posttblackwell@nationalpost.com

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/09/10/demand-for-plastic-surgery-growing-among-canadas-youth/feed/5std“The idea behind doing it at an early age ... is we want them to enjoy the advantages,” says Dr. Tom Buonassisi, a Vancouver facial plastic-surgery specialist. “If they have a very, very prominent feature ... it helps them emotionally at an early age.”Teens 'wary' consumers of safe sex information: studyhttp://news.nationalpost.com/2011/05/30/teens-wary-consumers-of-safe-sex-information-study/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/05/30/teens-wary-consumers-of-safe-sex-information-study/#commentsMon, 30 May 2011 21:42:38 +0000http://news.nationalpost.com/?p=67854

By Shannon Proudfoot

Many teens are “savvy consumers” who are skeptical about contraception information they find online or hear from their friends, new research suggests.

Researchers at New York’s Guttmacher Institute, which tracks public sex education in the U.S. and abroad, talked to 58 teens age 16 to 19 to find out where they get information on contraception and how much they trust it. While most teens in the survey had talked to friends about safe sex, only about one-third said they’d been exposed to contraception information online, and most were “wary”of the accuracy of information from both sources.

“There’s this assumption that teens are these blank slates and just uncritically absorb the information that’s given to them,” said Rachel Jones, a senior research associate and lead author of the paper. “Our expectation, not just with the Internet but in a variety of forums, was that teens are a little more critical of information.”

The teens surveyed were well aware that a search for birth control information online was likely to lead to a site selling something rather than offering quality information, and they “universally” pointed out that Wikipedia is an unreliable source of information that anyone can edit, the researchers found. They were most likely to trust sexual health information offered on sites from .edu, .org or .gov domains.

“There was this general distrust of the Internet for information, at least as it pertained to sexual health issues,”said Jones.

On the other hand, almost all of the teens interviewed said they’d been exposed to safe sex information at school and the vast majority viewed it as reliable.

And while parents might be rewarded with an eye-roll and a humiliated “Mom!” if they broach the topic, the study suggests that teens trust information received from their parents — and they’re thankful for it, even if they’re cringing.

“It’s uncomfortable for everyone,” said Jones. “Even when teens acknowledged it was uncomfortable, they still appreciated the fact that they interpreted it as a sign that ‘My mom or dad cares about me.’”

From family members, teenage girls were much more likely to get information about hormonal methods of birth control, while males most often got superficial information about using condoms. One 17-year-old boy told the researchers that his father, “pretty much told us, ‘Keep the lights off and use a condom.’”

The researchers also found many teens, particularly girls, are ambivalent about hormonal methods of birth control because of the litany of potential side-effects they hear in commercials.

Overall, Jones said the study, published in the current issue of the Journal of Adolescent Research, points to the importance of school-based sexual-health education and the need to direct teens to reliable online sources of information.

Alex McKay, research co-ordinator with the Sex Information and Education Council of Canada (SIECCAN), said the study results came as no surprise to him — with the exception of teens’ skepticism about Wikipedia, which he still sees university students citing as an authoritative source.

Tumbling teen pregnancy rates in Canada point to greater knowledge and empowerment when it comes to teens and contraception, he said, but the quality of sex education is uneven across Canada and even from classroom to classroom.

“There’s no question in my mind that today’s generation of youth is more savvy, knowledgeable and intelligent about their sexual health than any previous generation in history,”McKay said. “However, let’s be clear that that’s not saying very much. We shouldn’t kid ourselves that there isn’t a tremendous amount of progress that still needs to be made.”

Postmedia News

Selected comments from teens in the study:

“I think that they should really cover things like birth control because they don’t really say a lot about that. They say use a condom, pretty much.” — 17-year-old female on information at school

“That’s a place (school) that I would expect to know what they are talking about, to tell me the truth, to educate me on what I should know.” — 17-year-old male

“(My mother) is always telling me about she had me at a really young age. And she was like, ‘If you are going to have sex, I just really wish that you tell me so I could prepare you.” — 17-year-old female

“Well, from my parents, I would say what little I have gotten I could say I trust completely.” — 17-year-old male

“As guys . . . we talk about what we use, you know, not what the girl uses, ‘cause that’s kind of their thing. If they use birth control, they use it. If they don’t, they don’t. But for guys usually the only thing is condoms . . . that we know about for sure.” — 18-year-old male

“The Internet, it’s pretty much a giant billboard for sex. It’s not a good place to go if you are young, because all the pop-ups and things you could type in kind of makes you want to have sex.” — 17-year-old male

]]>http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/05/30/teens-wary-consumers-of-safe-sex-information-study/feed/1stdA new study says that teens are "wary" of sexual health information that comes from WikipediaOpinion: Abortion statistics show reality of a land without restrictionshttp://news.nationalpost.com/2011/03/07/opinion-abortion-statistics-show-reality-of-a-land-without-restrictions/
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/03/07/opinion-abortion-statistics-show-reality-of-a-land-without-restrictions/#commentsMon, 07 Mar 2011 10:01:25 +0000http://life.nationalpost.com/?p=12707

By Anastasia Bowles

Abortion is a topic few Canadians want to discuss, and abortion statistics rarely come up around the water cooler. So when an Ontario group, Project for an Ontario Women’s Health Evidence-Based Report (POWER), released a study last week on Ontario abortion rates for 2007, nobody seemed to notice. But they should have.

No matter what your position on abortion, the study reveals unsettling facts about abortions in Ontario, and by extension, in Canada. For example, we learn that for every 100 babies born in Ontario, 37 are aborted.

The ratio for teens aged 15-19 is even more shocking. For every 100 babies born to Ontario teens, 152 are aborted.

The study noted that teens “were by far the most likely of any age group to have an abortion rather than a live birth.” And since it excluded abortions for girls under 15, the teen abortion rate is even higher.

It also revealed disturbing data about repeat abortions in Ontario hospitals. As many as 52% of women had one or more previous abortions. Even more disturbing, almost one fifth of teens aged 15-19 said they had already had at least one abortion. The study even cautioned that the percentage of repeat abortions was likely higher due to under-reporting.

And that’s just for hospitals. Abortion clinics were excluded from the repeat calculations even though they perform more than half the province’s abortions. And teens don’t need parental consent for clinic abortions (though they may at some hospitals), so more teens may go to clinics.

Even fairly liberal parents might squirm to think that their child, aged 14 or younger, could walk into a clinic to have an abortion — more than once — and they would never know.

Most Canadians are unaware that teens don’t need parental consent to have an abortion. They don’t even have to inform their parents. In fact, most Canadians — 80% according to a 2010 Angus Reid poll — don’t even know we have no legal restrictions on abortion.

For the record, abortion is fully legal in Canada at any stage of pregnancy, for any reason, and for any Canadian citizen, and taxpayers pay for almost all of them.

LifeCanada, a national organization educating on the value of human life, has commissioned Environics to poll Canadians annually from 2002-2009. Each year, a large majority, anywhere from 60% to 66%, supported some legal restrictions on abortion.

So even though most Canadians don’t know the facts or statistics on abortion, they don’t support the current legal vacuum in Canada. Imagine if they actually knew something about the subject.

Why don’t they?

In the past, Statistics Canada collected abortion data through the Therapeutic Abortion Survey (TAS), but when the abortion law was struck down in 1988, some provinces interpreted the decision to mean they no longer had to report abortion data to Statistics Canada. Since that time, abortion statistics have become increasingly scarce.

In recent years, Statistics Canada deemed abortion data “unreliable” because too few clinics and hospitals reported. They even noted the absence of abortion data was “definitely a concern.”

In British Columbia, a law even prohibits citizens from accessing any statistics about abortions performed there. This in democratic Canada.

More recently, the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) took over responsibility for abortion statistics. Their report for 2007 and 2008, released last December, is riddled with categories labelled “unknown” because so few hospitals and clinics submit complete data.

By comparison, the new POWER study uses OHIP billing records and several different databases, making it more reliable than other recent data. This may account for a large discrepancy between the study’s and CIHI’s figures. The study does not give absolute numbers for abortions but it does provide the abortion to live birth ratio. Since Statistics Canada reports the number of Ontario live births as 138,000, this would suggest the number of Ontario abortions in 2007 may actually be around 51,000, much higher than CIHI’s figure of about 32,000.

However, the study is not without biases. It classifies some second trimester abortions as “early abortions” though it is doubtful most Canadians would agree.

Nonetheless, any data about abortion in Canada is valuable and welcome. One can’t help but wonder why all the secrecy if there is nothing to hide? For a cause that has always been championed as a woman’s right, it is ironic that information about something exclusively relevant to women’s health is ignored, or worse, suppressed. Shame.